SAN FRANCISCO — Consider the presidential candidate who campaigns as a feisty contrarian, the “anti-politician” with “new vision” — a fiscal miser and free-thinker who talks about ending big-money politics and shaking up his party, while attracting hordes of young voters.
Sound like Texas Republican Ron Paul in 2012?
No, that was Democratic presidential candidate Jerry Brown — in 1992.
Brown, 73, the third-term governor of California, made three runs for the presidency as a political maverick — in 1976, 1980 and 1992. Paul, 76, currently on his third run for the White House, ran in 1988 as a Libertarian, and again in 2008 as a Republican.
While they have widely divergent political viewpoints, Paul and Brown have displayed uncanny similarities in messaging, youth appeal, grassroots fundraising and social media outreach in their rebellious presidential campaigns — in which both have challenged their own party’s establishment.
Brown’s 1992 call to “take back America from the confederacy of corruption, careerism and campaign consulting in Washington” echoes the same populist themes as Paul’s. And Brown’s proposed flat tax and ideas for simpler, leaner finances in government mirror some of the Texas Republican’s calls.
Indeed, Paul may be borrowing some of his playbook from Brown, who sold himself as the “un-candidate” in his 1992 presidential drive — and whose record may teach Paul a thing or two about “revolution” politics in this year’s GOP race.
“Jerry Brown was Ron Paul before Ron Paul was Ron Paul,” said Phil Trounstine, a veteran California political analyst who covered Brown’s 1992 presidential run and who now co-publishes Calbuzz.com, a politics website.
“Jerry was different from the political establishment — and that’s Ron Paul,” said Martin Nolan, who has covered presidential elections since 1968 whose work as a Boston Globe reporter was chronicled in Timothy Crouse’s seminal book on political journalism, “The Boys on the Bus.”
The past presidential ambitions of Brown, and the current drive by Paul, may also underscore the potential impacts of “movement” politics — personality-driven and sometimes unconventional campaigns that can attract passionate followers.
While former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney increasingly looks to be on his way to becoming the GOP nominee, observers say Paul is almost certain to continue to challenge the front-runner while leveraging his support, clout and issues - perhaps all the way to the GOP national convention in August.
With former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Gov. Rick Perry splitting the social-conservative base, "it's hard to see how any of the alternatives (to Romney) survive, except maybe Ron Paul - who's like a Jerry Brown in 1992 because he has a solid base of support among young people," said Matthew Eshbaugh-Soha, associate professor of political science at the University of North Texas.
Mark DiCamillo, director of the Field Poll in California, calls Paul's support among under-30 voters "the most striking thing" about his candidacy.
Among under-30 voters in Iowa and New Hampshire, Paul won nearly half the vote, hammering Romney in that demographic. DiCamillo attributes Paul's success with young voters in those states to his "libertarian positions on social issues and his anti-interventionist foreign policy."
"In a kind of odd way, Paul is the anti-establishment candidate," DiCamillo said. That's a label that traditionally has stuck to Democratic candidates, including Brown and Sens. Eugene McCarthy and Bobby Kennedy in 1968, and Gary Hart in his 1984 run against Walter Mondale.
Trounstine said Brown, like Paul, excited his base with an appeal to take big money out of politics.
Paul has used innovations like online "money bomb" appeals to reach grassroots donors - two decades after Brown adviser Joe Trippi launched an 800 phone number to attract small donors. And two decades before Paul's team effectively harnessed social media, Trippi signed Brown up for the first-ever online political chat with his followers - in 1992.
"Jerry Brown was plugged in to new networks, and Paul has done the same thing," said Nolan, a San Francisco resident who covered Brown's 1976 and 1980 presidential bids.
Right until the end of his last run, Brown sharply criticized the man who would be his party's nominee - Bill Clinton. Paul has not shrunk from criticizing Romney, leading to speculation he may take his campaign all the way to the GOP convention.
Rep. Ron Paul says he’s in it to win it and the campaign boasts that it has a comprehensive strategy in place to ensure that happens.
But behind the scenes Campaign Manager Jesse Benton admits to ABC News that the team is plotting a back up strategy in case the congressman doesn’t pull in enough delegates to become the nominee.
If the campaign comes up short at the convention, Benton says the plan is to use all the delegates awarded to Paul as a bargaining chip to force the Republican Party to stick to its limited government platform.
Benton says this could include auditing the Federal Reserve and winding back several parts of the Patriot Act, including roving wire taps which he says were originally written with the intent of expiring.
“I think it would be wise for the Republican Party to allow them to sun set next time they come up for authorization,” said Benton, adding a good portion of the American people are with that.
According to his campaign chairman, Jesse Benton, Paul has a coordinator in Puerto Rico. The campaign has a “Hispanic for Ron Paul” team that prominently features a Puerto Rican business-leader. A non-affiliated group, Puerto Rico for Ron Paul, has also been disseminating caucus-related information.
That the Texas Republican is investing any resources at all in Puerto Rico may strike some as wasteful. Few political observers take Paul seriously as a potential nominee, even after he scored a second-place finish in the New Hampshire primary. Primaries, after all, are won through momentum: a few early victories beget others, which, in turn, beget more donors, endorsements, excitement, and ultimately more victories.
The Paul campaign does not subscribe to that theory.
“Ours is a delegate strategy,” said Benton. “We want to win the 1,100 delegates. If [former Massachusetts Gov.]Mitt Romney has secured 1,150 delegates, then it is game over. But we are going to contest that until the very end, and again we have a goal. We wouldn’t be doing this if we didn’t think we can win 1,150 delegates.”
Who is Paul looking to for inspiration? It might surprise you: President Obama’s primary run. Here’s Stein:
It’s the Money Ball of campaign strategies and it’s rooted in, of all places, Obama’s 2008 campaign.
“You try to look at what models have worked in the past and Obama’s model worked,” said Benton. “Now we have different ideas about where we would like to take the country, but he ran a brilliant campaign. He unleashed his grassroots to work hard, get involved in their communities, and really fight for some principles and that’s what we are trying to do too.”
“Let’s say they clean up in the caucus states,” the source said. “Let’s say they control 20 votes out of 100 in those committees, then they can force votes on those issues. They can make a motion on the floor to amend the agenda, to amend the platform … They could force certain issues to be voted on. They could force the convention to consider certain questions and force the human beings on the committees to address certain things. How about a more robust version of the ‘audit the Fed’ platform? All of a sudden you will get recorded votes on those issues.
As the Broncos move into the offseason, John Elway will erase his in-season boundaries between front office executive and quarterback expert when it comes to Tim Tebow.
"I'm going to stand up there from the balcony and yell at him," Elway joked Monday.
Elway plans to be on the field with Tebow as often as NFL rules allow this spring and summer.
Elway was unable to spend any time with Tebow last offseason because of the NFL lockout. Now Tebow has 13 more starts in his career, and Elway has a much better gauge on what he thinks Tebow needs to improve heading into next season.
The focus will not be on the mechanics of Tebow's release, but on improving the young quarterback's footwork, timing and ability to read defenses.
"Your feet and your time clock—to be able to tie those things together, those will be the things we work on and there will be some film study too as far as different reads and where he's looking on different plays," Elway said. "He's going to be more comfortable having worked with this offense now in his second year, and he's going to be more natural with the reads and the things that he sees when he drops back."
The Broncos' voluntary offseason program for Tebow and his teammates under contract can't begin until late April, after which Tebow will be able to spend up to four hours a day, four days a week working with the coaching staff at Dove Valley team headquarters.
Rookie report. Coach John Fox said he was happy that Denver's 2011 draft class produced three starters. And he is optimistic that more of this season's rookies will contribute quickly.
Still, the season was fascinating. The Broncos provided heart-pounding drama, winning four overtime games. They were sometimes brilliant, as in the victory over the Steelers, and sometimes painful to watch, as in the regular-season finale against the Chiefs.
This extreme inconsistency must end if the Broncos want to continue to climb. Tebow knows this. He led two Florida teams to national championships. He knows how big winners operate.
"Absolutely," he said about improving, "throughout the season, throughout games, you definitely would love to be more consistent. You look at great teams and usually they are. You have a few lows, a few highs, but for the most part they stay consistent."
There’s plenty of reason for optimism. Tebow is one of America’s best-known residents, right up there with President Obama and Jennifer Aniston, but he’s not the Broncos best hope for the future.
I don’t believe the day ever will arrive when we describe Tebow as the NFL’s best quarterback, but we someday might call Demaryius Thomas the NFL’s best receiver and Von Miller the NFL’s best linebacker.
Let me go ahead and predict the Broncos will repeat as AFC West champions. This is not a bold prediction. The Raiders are still the Raiders, mangy and confused and doomed to failure evermore, and Norv Turner, the Prince of Mediocrity, still coaches the Chargers, and Kyle Orton could be the starting quarterback in Kansas City. Winning the West is similar to being the smartest member of the Three Stooges.
Tags: Tim Tebow typical Athlete, Tebow Clifton Woman, Tebow little with, Tebow OC Dolphins, Tebow Brady face, Tebow the hype, Tebow Story, Tebow good mix, Tebow over NFL
ENGLEWOOD, Colorado — The debate over Tim Tebow’s worthiness as an NFL quarterback will undeniably continue in the offseason.
What’s not in doubt is his status as the Denver Broncos’ starter.
The team sought to curb the circus that’s sure to surround Tebow over the next several months by declaring him the incumbent at a season-ending news conference on Monday.
“Well, I think Tim’s earned the right to be the starting quarterback going into training camp,” Broncos boss John Elway declared at the beginning of a 40-minute news conference in which 24 of the 47 questions were about Tebow.
“I think he made some good strides this year,” Elway said. “He obviously played very well against Pittsburgh and played very well in a lot of football games.
On the chance that they could see Tebow before the 2009 College Football Awards, Kelly and her dad, Jim, an attorney, staked out a spot at the ESPN zone restaurant. They were hoping to catch a glimpse of Tebow as he walked by. They chatted up a few of the restaurant employees and Kelly vivaciously told them of her hope to meet Tebow, Jim said.
Tebow was late, but eventually walked through the restaurant and waved to the crowd before disappearing into a private banquet room.
“Well, I thought, that’s it,” Jim said. “We got a wave from Timmy and I thought that was the end of it. Then, somebody came to our table and asked if we wanted to meet Timmy.”
Stunned, they were whisked into a private affair. Kelly was seated at Tebow’s side and they chatted during the entire dinner. The rest of the Faughnan family was seated nearby. To this day, nobody can really explain how or why Tebow plucked the young Clifton woman from the crowd. Kelly certainly wanted to meet him, but the family had no connections that would normally make it happen.
“It’s just his faith,” Kelly said. “We are God-friends.”
After the dinner, Tebow had another surprise in store, Kelly remembered.
“We are just sitting there and he said, ‘what are you doing tomorrow night. Why don’t you come to the awards dinner as my date,’” Kelly said. “I was shocked. I said yes. I felt like Cinderella.”
Unprepared for a formal dinner, the family had brought flip-flops and shorts for a visit to Disney World. They spent the next day “power shopping,” and getting their hair done, said Kelly’s mom, Janet.
Since then, they have stayed in touch, exchanging messages and gifts. Kelly sent the quarterback a box of nutrition bars and he sent her an engraved Bible for Christmas. The family has also attended two games, including one in December in Denver that was arranged by the Tim Tebow Foundation.
Tags: Tim Tebow typical Athlete, Tim Tebow Patriots, Tim Tebow Broncos, Tebow little with, Tebow OC Dolphins, Tebow Brady face, Tebow the hype, Tebow Story, Tebow good mix, Tebow over NFL
